Pretexts for such action were not hard to find under the terms of the constitution; but their political interests suffered so much in the effort that the promoters had to abandon it.
Owing to persistent obstruction on the part of Congress, which took the form of a refusal either to sanction his appointments or to approve the budget, the President suspended the sessions of that body in 1908 and decreed a continuance of the estimates for the preceding year.

The antagonism between the chief executive and the legislature became so violent that, if his opponents had not been split up into factions, civil war might have ensued in Argentina.
To remedy a situation made worse by the absence--usual in most of the Hispanic republics--of a secret ballot and by the refusal of political malcontents to take part in elections, voting was made both obligatory and secret in 1911, and the principle of minority representation was introduced.

Legislation of this sort was designed to check bribery and intimidation and to enable the radical-minded to do their duty at the polls.

Its effect was shown five years later, when the secret ballot was used substantially for the first time.

The radicals won both the presidency and a majority in the Congress.
One of the secrets of the prosperity of Argentina, as of Brazil, in recent years has been its abstention from warlike ventures beyond its borders and its endeavor to adjust boundary conflicts by arbitration.
Even when its attitude toward its huge neighbor had become embittered in consequence of a boundary decision rendered by the President of the United States in 1895, it abated none of its enthusiasm for the principle of a peaceful settlement of international disputes.